For all married couples the excitement experienced as newlyweds fades with time. All spouses encounter challenges in their responsibilities to each other. More often than not the issues are resolved, but sometimes they are beyond repair. For those marriages that fail, most divorces are amicable, some are contentious, and a few are heinous. The latter is likely the unfortunate outcome of the union of forty-year-old Stephen Marfeo and his thirty-four-year-old wife Doreen.

Doreen was last seen by a friend in her Johnston, Rhode Island, home, ten miles west of Providence, on the morning of March 29, 1990. There has been no trace of her for thirty-four years.

Police hold out little hope that Doreen Marfeo could still be alive. They believe her husband was responsible for her disappearance and probable murder.

If Stephen Marfeo killed his wife, he took the secret of the location of her grave to his grave.

Stephen And Doreen Marfeo

Stephen Marfeo and Doreen Dobson married in 1978. It was Stephen’s second marriage; he had two children from his first marriage. He and Doreen did not have children.

Stephen worked in the jewelry business while Doreen was the purchasing editor at the Rhode Island School of Design. Both enjoyed the outdoors and lived active lifestyles.

The marriage was often rocky. Only two years after tying the knot, Doreen had an affair and told family members she was considering leaving Stephen, but she ultimately stayed with him and ended the dalliance.

Married For Eleven Years

Doreen surprised everyone in October 1989 by abruptly quitting her job, saying she wanted a change. When pressed, she told coworkers she and Stephen were having problems and she needed to focus on repairing her marriage.

Stephen acknowledged the marital difficulties and says Doreen began behaving erratically after quitting her job; he believed she was having a nervous breakdown.

A Major Life Change

Six months later, on the morning of March 29, 1990, a friend chatted with Doreen briefly in the Marfeo’s home shortly after Stephen had gone to work.

When he came home from work at noon, Stephen says he ate lunch with Doreen before returning to work. When he returned home shortly after 5:00 p.m., Doreen’s car, a 1984 Ford Tempo, was parked in the garage, but she was not at home. In searching their closet, Stephen found several of Doreen’s blouses, shirts, and jeans were missing and $600 in cash had been taken from the couple’s safe. There was no sign of a struggle inside the home.

Stephen said he assumed Doreen needed some time away from him. After two days passed with no word from her, he reported his wife missing.

No Doreen

Investigators became suspicions of Stephen after meeting with him at his home the following morning. A large rainstorm had occurred the evening before, making driving treacherous. After finding Stephen’s car in the garage to be wet, police asked him his whereabouts for the evening prior. Stephen responded he had been at home.

When police found a pair of his jeans that were wet from the knees down, however, Stephen changed his story, saying he had gone for a walk in the rainstorm.

Suspicions were further aroused after it was found that Stephen had hired two private investigators to follow Doreen in the year preceding her disappearance. He believed his wife was again having an affair, but neither P.I. found any evidence of recent infidelity.

Stephen Falls Under Suspicion

On June 13, two-and-a-half months after Doreen disappeared, police received two anonymous letters, both of which also accused her of extramarital affairs. The letters were mailed from the Boston area.

The first letter referred to Doreen as a “cheap harlot” and named several former co-workers with whom she had supposedly been sexually active. Friends and family had no inklings of her extramarital involvement with anyone.

Like the private investigators, the police also found no evidence of Doreen being unfaithful.

           

                                          Excerpts From The First Letter

The second letter accused Stephen of murdering Doreen, saying he had dumped her body in a pond in Providence. Police found no proof to the contents of this letter either, but the possibility that Stephen had murdered his wife was soon deemed credible.

Excerpts From The Second Letter

Dr. Murray Miron, a renowned forensic linguist at Syracuse University in New York, examined the letters and not only concluded that Stephen Marfeo had likely written them himself but also that he was probably responsible for Doreen’s disappearance.

Police seized several typewriters to which Stephen had access. A typestyle comparison on the first letter determined it was written on his mother’s typewriter.

Stephen denied writing either letter. He soon hired an attorney and refused to further talk with the police.

The Finger Is Pointed At Stephen . . . 

Adding to suspicions, Stephen typically took a twenty-to-thirty minute lunch break from work; on the day of Doreen’s disappearance, his chow time was seventy minutes.

Stephen was likely more than really hungry during this elongated lunch. Police believe he probably killed Doreen in that time period and disposed of her remains, though not in a pond in Providence, as was claimed in the first letter.

Furthermore, Stephen was worried that Doreen was having an affair, but he seemed less concerned that she was missing, as he had not asked the private investigators to search for her.

Without a body or even any evidence that a crime had been committed, however, prosecutors believed they did not have sufficient evidence to charge Stephen in connection with Doreen’s disappearance.

. . . But There Is Not Enough Evidence

Though Stephen and Doreen were having marital troubles, police believe Doreen did not disappear voluntarily. Although Stephen says she took $600 from their safe, she did not withdraw any of the $50,000 from the couple’s joint bank account. Police believe she would done so if she had intended to vanish.

Doreen’s Disappearance

Is Not Likely Voluntary

Several years after Doreen disappeared, Stephen Marfeo began dating a woman named Lori Vincent.

On July 30, 1999, several months after the thirty-eight-year-old Lori ended the relationship with the fifty-year-old Stephen, he shot her to death and wounded her new boyfriend, fifty-five-year-old Salvatore Puleo, as they were in a car on the driveway of Puleo’s North Providence home.

Lori Vincent And Sal Puleo

Stephen was tracked to the secluded Barkhamsted Reservoir in Connecticut where he shot himself in the head as a state trooper approached him.

Several guns were found in Stephen’s Pontiac Firebird. Ballistics tests showed that bullets from his Glock nine-millimeter handgun had been used to shoot Lori Vincent and Sal Puleo.

Stephen Murderer Lori . . .

In a suicide note addressed to his mom, Angelina, Stephen expressed guilt over Doreen’s disappearance, but he did not admit to any involvement or knowledge of her whereabouts.

Police believe Stephen Marfeo killed Doreen and that he was probably the only person who knew the location of her remains. If Doreen’s remains are ever found, it will likely be only by chance.

. . . And He Likely Killed Doreen Too

At the time of his suicide, Stephen still lived in the house he had shared with Doreen. Police searched the property as well as the Barkhamsted Reservoir, but neither search unearthed Doreen’s remains.

The Marfeo Home

Multiple sightings of Doreen Marfeo reported for several years after her disappearance could not be confirmed. Authorities believe the sightings were of people who resembled her and that she was likely murdered by Stephen on March 29, 1990, the day she was last seen.

Doreen Is Presumed Deceased

Doreen Ann Marfeo has been missing since March 29, 1990. At the time of her disappearance, she was thirty-four-years-old, five-feet-seven-inches tall, and weighed one-hundred-fifteen pounds. She had brown hair, green eyes, pierced ears and a pale, freckled complexion. She also had a large chicken pox scar on the front of her right calf and a cap on one of her front teeth.

Doreen’s allergies often caused her throat to swell. She spoke with a pronounced New England accent.

Doreen Marfeo would today be sixty-eight-years-old. If you have any information relating to her disappearance or to the location of her remains, please contact the Johnston, Rhode Island, Police Department at 401-231-4210. The detective in charge of the investigation is Steven Lopez who can also be emailed at [email protected]

Doreen Last Seen

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/183896068/laura-d_-vincent

SOURCES:

• Boston Globe
• The Charley Project
• Concord Mointor
• The Doe Network
• Hartford Courant
• NamUs
• Providence Journal
• Rhode Island Echo
• Unsolved Mysteries